Dismissing a petition filed by one Channabasappa, a resident of Nargund taluk in Gadag district, Justice Sachin Shankar Magadum noted that a larger bench of the SC had clarified this position in the Vineeta Sharma case.
“The ruling emphasizes gender equality and ensures that daughters and their heirs receive their rightful share inancestral property, irrespective of when the daughter passed away.
The judgment essentially corrects a historical imbalance by granting daughters and their legal heirs the same rights as the sons in ancestral property, regardless of when the daughter passed away,” the judge observed.
The SC held that the provisions (of the amendment) are retroactive and they confer benefits based on the antecedent events and the Mitakshara co-parcenary is deemed to include a reference to a daughter as a co-parcener,” Justice Magadum said.
“If Section 6(1)(a) makes a daughter by birth a co-parcener in her own right and in the same manner as the son, the legal heirs of the deceased daughter cannot be denied the benefit of the 2005 amendment,” the judge ruled.
Channabasappa, a defendant in a family partition suit, had challenged the October 3, 2023, order passed by the Prin-cipal Civil Judge in Gadag, wherein, his plea was rejected. He had prayed for amending the preliminary decree granting equal share to the legal heirs of deceased daughters -Nagavva and Sangavva, on the ground that they had died prior to the amendment to the Hindu Succession Act, 2005.
The judge said the judgment in the Vineeta Sharma case is applicable to other cases retrospectively. “It extends the benefit of the 2005 amendment to daughters, meaning that the legal heirs of a predeceased daughter are entitled to a share of ancestral property, just like they would have been had the daughter been alive at the time of the 2005 amendment,” he noted.